


A Little Birdie Told Me - A BMC Fic

by magicath004



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz, Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz (Two River Cast) RPF, Be More Chill - Ned Vizinni
Genre: Abusive Friendship, Invasion of Privacy, M/M, Mostly Fluff, cursing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-20
Updated: 2019-02-20
Packaged: 2019-11-01 09:11:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17864561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magicath004/pseuds/magicath004
Summary: Michael Mell has never been a good wingman, but he'd do whatever it takes to set his best friend up with the cute boy in her class.Jeremy Heere is too popular for his own good, and far too popular for the kid he has his eyes on.Can they figure out their mess of a connection before the rumors start to fly and secrets spill across the school?So happy to be working for the 2019 Be More Chill Big Bang!





	A Little Birdie Told Me - A BMC Fic

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mariesghostart](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=mariesghostart).



“God, Michael, he’s so adorable. Like Jeremy Jordan from Newsies adorable. And popular, but not like,  _ mean _ popular. He doesn’t even seem popular, you know?” Michael managed to tear himself away from a marathon of Glee to glance at Christine on the couch above his perch on the floor.

“Chris,” he began, exasperated, “You’ve said it enough, okay? I get it.” He realized how sharp his tone was when he noticed his friend’s face fall. Groaning at her expression, he begrudgingly pressed the power button on the remote and shut off the ancient TV they were binging in front of. “Fine. Tell me more about this dream guy.” Christine brightened again, her eyes lighting up as she explained the quiet kid in her drama class. After another minute or so, she gasped.

“What if,” she started, drumming her fingertips on Michael’s shoulder. “What if you talked to him for me? Like, you know, put in a good word or something?” Michael turned to her, deadpan.

“Of course, C, because I am absolutely fantastic when talking to strangers. And boys. Oh, and I’m amazing when it comes to talking to strangers who just so happen to be boys.” Christine pursed her lips like she does when she thinks too hard.

“Okay, fine, sure. Whatever.” She said, formulating a weak plan but a plan nonetheless. “But the Michael I know would do anything for his friends. Like, eat a twelve-year-old ketchup packet if I asked. Or, you know, talk to this guy for me?” 

“Christine,” Michael said, trying to be stern to no avail.

“Michael,” she shot back, dropping her voice an octave and grinning with mockery.

“This is totally guilt-tripping,” Michael started, rubbing his temples. “Or blackmail. Or something along those lines, but it’s probably illegal.” He sighed but nodded before his best friend could say anything else. Christene jumped up, pumping her fists before hugging Michael. Or, really, a part of Michael considering the fact that she could barely reach his shoulders. 

“Thanks, Mikey!” She exclaimed, pulling back just far enough to let the boy breathe. “Okay, okay, okay, so, he said he has science fourth period! So he’s in your class, alright? So simply sit down next to him and have a bro-conversation or whatever, and bam! There we go!” She bounced on the balls of her feet, anticipation bubbling inside of her brain. Michael nodded slowly, scratching his chin in faux consideration.

“Of course, of course. The simple  _ bro-conversation  _ with a guy I’ve never met before to give him the hots for my best friend. Got it.” He muttered the last part, knowing that he would go through with it for Christine but not enjoy it unless absolutely mandatory. 

“Great!” The girl tittered, putting her hands on his shoulder and not-so-gently shoving him towards the door. “Now get out of my house! I have homework that should probably be done although it most likely won’t be. Bye!” She said, pushing him as she talked and grinning before shutting the door in his face. Michael rolled his eyes and waited on the front stoop. Christine had a typical way of ending conversations, and it usually didn’t involve a simple goodbye. Maybe ten, fifteen seconds later, she opened the door a crack and wiggled her head out of the gap. “Sorry if that was rude or anything, I totally didn’t mean it like that. You know that. You know that, right, Micha? Whatever. Text me later, okay?” she rushed before Chris once again closed the door. Satisfied with that being the last farewell, Michael spun on his heels and climbed down the steps of her front porch, meandering to his car. He remembered his friend’s philosophy that she called  _ the sooner rule.  _ She normally used it to count down days until her birthday or Christmas or something, but he ran through the rule as he turned the key in the ignition. The sooner he gets home, goes to bed, wakes up, goes to school, blah blah blah, the sooner he would have to face either public humiliation or a happy Christine. After years of awkward bonding over short attention spans and music tastes that didn’t fit into one specific genre, Michael felt like he owed it to her. So, feeling less reluctant than a few moments before, he began step one and made his way home. 

 

If there’s any specific fact that every single one of Jeremy’s friends knew, it was that he absolutely  _ despised  _ science. None of them could tell you why or what he had against it, but they all  _ knew.  _ They had lunch after Jeremy’s science class, and he always came in disheveled and more sunburnt looking than usual. His hair always looked like someone had brushed through it with a fork, even if he came to school with it gelled up. Every day, without interruption, someone at their overflowing table would ask him what was wrong. And every day, the answer was somewhere along the scale of, “Just had science class,” to “What in the world is a cellular membrane? It’s stupid. That whole CLASS is stupid.” He also tended to be pretty secretive about his grades, but Jeremy didn’t seem to have a single assignment in that class that ever scored above a seventy. Naturally, his posse had to figure something out. Jenna had at least twelve different spies in Mrs. Cooper’s fourth period, but Jeremy was still oblivious to them and the teacher herself. 

 

Michael flung his battered grey backpack underneath his seat before falling into it. Hard. Maybe there was a  _ “buy five thousand, get twenty-five hundred free!”  _ deal on rock hard chairs attached to desks by flimsy metal bars because they were absolutely _ everywhere.  _ Michael had an ongoing theory that staff bathrooms had the same desk installments on the toilets, for grading papers on the go or perhaps a chair connected to the sinks. He smiled at the thought before pulling out last night’s homework, which was done with the help of his study buddy who went by the name of Google. He dug around a bit to grab a pencil, grabbing at a stub of one with half a point left. Satisfied, Michael poked his head up, glancing around the room.  _ What was his name again?  _ He thought, flicking his focus from one unrecognizable head to another. He turned to a quiet boy that sat behind him, a kid maybe a few months younger than him and Chris. The boy kept his blond head down, holding an arm covered with a cast close to his chest. 

“Yo,” Michael started, “Do you know a kid named, uh, Jerry? Maybe Jordan. Something with a J. In this class?”  

“Jeremy?” the kid squeaked, the tips of his ears turning red. 

“Yeah!” Michael grinned, spinning back around in his seat. “Thanks, man. Jeremy.” Another boy, a few rows of desks up, spun his head in Michael’s direction. 

“W-what?”

“What?” Michael responded. “Are you Jeremy?” The kid nodded, fiddling with the collar of his navy blue polo. His clothes were crisp, pairing his shirt with a pair of wrinkle-free jeans. He sported classic Chuck Taylors, looking only a little bit scuffed up, which seemed impressive. Michael could barely go a day in new shoes without spilling nacho cheese on them or doodling tiny Pac-Man's. Subconsciously, he crossed one foot in front of the other. 

_ Alright,  _ Michael thought to himself,  _ We’ve found the guy. Now just don't make a fool of yourself. I mean, I don’t matter in this. Simply make Chris look good. That’s not hard, right? I know everything about he- _

His internal monologue was cut short by actual learning or whatever. Michael started to zone off before attendance even started. By this point in the day, everyone was either hungry, still tired, or thinking of ways to ditch school while in the middle of class. His thoughts were lingering over the latter a little too long - almost considering simply walking out of the first-floor window - when a small ball of paper rolled to a stop when it hit his shoe. Michael blinked, staring at it, before realizing how nonchalant that must have looked. Swiftly, he bent down and snatched up the ball with one hand and pulled at his hoodie zipper with the other. He spread the paper out on his leg, smoothing out as many of the wrinkles as possible before revealing a layer of ballpoint chicken scratch. 

_ What do you want, man? You said my name WAY too loud back there. Hella distracting.  _

Micha looked up from the note to a few seats ahead of him, where the same lanky boy was glancing over his shoulder. He stuck his hand out, palm up and fingers loose, in the international symbol for  _ ‘what is this guy doing?’ _ Michael stuck one finger up at him, asking for a minute before he turned the scrap over and began to scrawl on the back. He must have erased four or five times before he had something reasonable written down, but even then he was sure there was some sort of grammatical error in there. 

_ Oh yeahhhhh, sorry bout that. Long story, but my friend is into yo- _

No.

_ Forgot your name. _

Why would he even know it in the first place?

_ Oops. Just needed to talk with you lmao _

Alright. Not overly creepy, or formal, or totally unreadable. Maybe in the B- to a C+ range if the scrap had a rubric stuck on it somewhere. Shrugging, he crumpled it back into a tight ball and dropped it by his feet, giving the sphere a kick before turning back to the front of the room. Something about evolution was in the process of being erased by some mousy teacher’s pet. Before the section of the board that was covered by notes about Darwin’s finches could be erased, the paper ball rolled back to Michael’s chair. 

Alright? Do you know where the 1UP is? I can meet there after school if that works

Michael grinned, flashing a thumbs up at the boy in front of him.  _ Yeah, I know the place.  _  Jeremy caught his eye and nodded, letting loose a bit of a smirk before turning back to one of his friends across the aisle. 

 

He slapped the note down on the gross linoleum table that he shared with Christine. Sometimes her theatre friends came around, or his smattering of Super Mario enthusiasts, but their corner of the lunchroom seemed mostly barren today. 

“Bam,” Michael said, gesturing at the paper. Chris gingerly took it in her hands and read over each side once, twice, at least three times before setting it down again with a grin. “I got a meeting with your man, Crissy. I’m going to talk you up  _ so  _ much,” she giggled. “Michael is gonna wingman  _ crazy _ well.” He sat down opposite her on the thick plastic bench, chewing on a (most likely expired) bag of Combos that had fallen out of his locker. 

“First of all,” his friend said, scrolling through her Spotify playlist before settling on the  _ Falsettos  _ soundtrack, “Don’t call me that, weirdo. It makes me sound like a thirty-six-year-old nurse with four kids who wants to speak with your manager.” Micha almost choked on his chips. “And you better let me come with you tonight.” She drummed her fingers on the table, impatient. 

“What, to spy on me? I won’t mess up that bad, I swear.” He smirked. 

“I’ll pay for gas?” 

“Deal. You drive, I’ll talk about you, we get some nachos, all good.” He thrust out his hand, his bracelets that Christine had made him over the years jangling on his wrist. She shook it, her smile almost as bright as her sunflower yellow dress. 

“Thanks, weirdo!” She quipped.   

 

The 1UP was notorious for being the oldest arcade-slash-only place that sold decent nachos in town. It attracted its fair share of  _ DnD _ players mixed with video game geeks, letting Michael and Chris blend in relatively unnoticed. There was a bar in the back of the long, thin building that the pair had been dying to check out since middle school, but for now, they settled for the vintage pinball machines that lined one wall. If you somehow managed to wiggle  _ Jurassic Park _ themed machine away from the wall far enough to see the peeling backside, there’d be the initials of the duo scratched in the paint over an over again. Six times with a tight  _ MM _ and four with a sloppy pair of C’s, if you counted. One little carving for each time one of them had beaten the entire game. Growing up, the managed to squeeze into the game vault at every free second they had. By this point, after ages of hunching over this machine together and yelling out when to flip, both sets of parents knew where to look if their kids every disappeared one day. Chances are, they nacho machine was still on after hours and they handed over a twenty for a bottomless basket. Thus, it only felt like two polar opposite worlds were colliding when Michael spotted the other boy veering around sharp corners in  _ Pacman _ on the other side of the room. 

“Don’t look now,” he whispered, leaning in right as Chris hit the ball past the tiny ‘ _ Shoot the T-REX when lit!’  _ sign. “But your dude is next to  _ Frogger.  _ The one in the jacket.” 

“ _ Mrs. Pacman _ or the classic?” She whispered back, but their voices were totally swallowed up by cheap sound effects and buzzing of old TV monitors. 

“Classic. He’s not playing too bad, either.” He shrugged with his eyebrows knit together, turning back to his friend’s game. Jeremy seemed to be getting pretty far, but if he came anywhere close to Michael’s score, there was going to be a full-on brawl in broad daylight.

“A man with good tastes,” Christene grunted under her breath, hissing as her ball zoomed through the flappers at the bottom of the game. “ _ Shoot _ . I got distracted.”

“Not a bad score, though,” a voice behind the pair surmised, making Christine nearly jump out of her daisy patterned converse.  “Oh, god, I-I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you or anyth-” Jeremy reached out and grabbed Christine by the shoulder, but it wasn’t clear if he was trying to steady her or himself. Slowly, he pulled his hand back, the tips of his ears turning as red as the sunset painted on the back of the machine they were huddled around. “Sorry,” he muttered again, digging his fingers into the pockets on the sides of his letterman’s jacket. It was a dark blue color with black accents, the standard of their high school, but he had attached some patches across the chest and covering the elbows. None of them seemed to match any specific theme or had anything in common with one another, but Jeremy managed to pull it off. He had a sunny-side up egg on his left elbow, which complemented a pterodactyl on the other. The boy managed to take an article of clothing normally reserved for the preps and jocks and smother it with nerdiness. Michael nodded slightly, subconsciously giving the patches his word of approval. Recovering her usual cheerfulness in record time, Chris beamed. 

“Hey! Jeremy, right? I think we had theatre as an elective last year together, ‘cause I totally remember you getting all sweaty right before your monologue performance, but then you got up there and talked about being popular and stuff, and you totally aced it!” After spewing out the better part of a paragraph one breath, she gasped deeply before continuing to smile at the newcomer. Jeremy smiled too, but it barely seemed to reach his eyes. His brain was elsewhere- or rather, zooming away from here at the speed of sound. It seemed rigid, formal; more polite than genuine. 

“I kinda remember that… I ended up scraping by on that performance grade, but thanks, I guess?”  _ Damn,  _ Michael thought to himself, realizing how rapidly a mediocre introduction from his best friend turned into astral projection by the dude she had the hots for. “Oh!” Jeremy exclaimed, turning to Michael as though just now seeing him. “Can I steal you for a second?” The other boy hesitated, nervously tapping at the buttons that operated the game. If you listened hard enough, you might actually hear him tapping out S.O.S. This wasn’t part of the plan. Before he could refuse, his cheerful companion interjected for him. 

“No problem!” she chirped, though Michael knew her well enough to see her subtle confusion. “I’ll be here if you all need me!” She pulled a quarter out from her pockets and slipped it into the coin slot, already triggering the mechanics to drop another ball into her zone. Jeremy grabbed Michael by his wrist, weaving the pair through rows of games and nacho eating customers. After maybe a minute or so of Michael having to take two steps for every one of Jeremy’s long strides, they stopped next to a few retro-styled vending machines. 

“Hey,” Jeremy said, speedily dropping his hand from the shorter boy’s wrist.

“Hey,” Michael said back, resisting an urge to run back to his friend's side. It was her day, after all. 

“So, uh, what did you,” Jeremy flushed, “Need to talk about? In class today?” He dug his hands into the pockets of his varsity jacket, and Michael felt his own face light up with recognition. 

“Right, that!” he exclaimed, his thoughts racing. After deciding on a nonchalant approach, he shrugged. “It was nothing. My friend back there, Chris, she’s like...into you? And wanted me to chat her up.” He chuckled, hoping he didn’t just throw his best friend under the bus and then roll over her once or twice. 

Slowly, Jeremy brought himself to nod. In his head, he counted down from ten in time with his breathing, a tip brought to him by his therapist he had been diagnosed with severe anxiety after having hallucinogenic episodes during a school play. He counted again, quicker this time, not wanting to keep the other boy waiting for him to calm down. “Ah,” Jeremy started, trying not to think about how much time he spent that day thinking over every possibility of this conversation. This, however, had not shown up.  _ His friend,  _ he thought to himself, turning the words over and over in his mind until they didn’t feel like English anymore.  _ Not him, he was talking about his friend. _ “Your friend. Right,” he saw Michael glance at him quizzically, so he rushed for a response. “She’s cute! Tell her she’s cute,” he threw out quickly, attempting to reassure the other boy. 

“I actually think I’m gonna go, dude,” Michael said, raising the tail end of the sentence as more of a question than a statement. Maybe it was the way the popular boy’s face blanched at the topic of Chris or how jittery he seemed afterward, but something wasn’t going as smoothly as Michael thought a “bro-conversation” would. 

“Oh, shoot. I’m sorry, man. I, I didn’t mean to be weird or anything, I just-” Jeremy sighed, pulling back his arm from where it hung, wondering whether to reach out and stop the other boy’s exit or not. “I didn't know what you wanted to talk about today. I wasn't really expecting you to be a wingman, actually.” He laughed nervously, and Michael saw an ounce of tension drop out of his shoulders. 

“Yeah, I’m not really sure why she put  _ me _ up to this job,” Michael smiled rather sheepishly, gesturing back at the girl playing pinball. “She knows that it doesn’t really go well when I’m the one talking to dudes. It’s one of the many fortes I simply don’t have.” Jeremey full on laughed at that, leaning his head back in a way that made his auburn hair shine in the LED lights surrounding them. It looked almost magical if Michael was telling the truth. He was starting to see where Chris was coming from with the nervous nerd disguised as a high school popular. 

“That’s something I can actually relate to, dude. Talking to new people sucks.” He hesitated. “Not you and Chris, though. You seem...really cool. Cooler than some of the people I have to hang out with.” Michael grinned, turning to the vending machine he was leaning on and shuffled through the contents of the pockets on the side of his red hoodie. After digging through what must have been weeks of lint and candy wrappers, he pulled out two dollar bills and stuck them in the machine. As always, he tapped the buttons D4 for two bottles of Cherry Coke. He grabbed them before they could fully drop down into the slot, tossing a bottle over to Jeremy and twisting open the cap on his own. “Thanks,” Jeremy said, barely catching it. The two things Jake had always wanted him to work on were hand-eye coordination and cutting processed sugar out of his diet, and it seemed Jeremy broke both rules in a matter of seconds. Pushing that thought away, he opened the bottle. 

“So,” Michael started, after chugging down a half bottle of carbonation and syrup, “What’s wrong with the people you have to hang out with?” Michael knew well enough of Jeremy’s general crowd, due to not living under a rock for most of high school. Jake, Brooke, Chloe, Jenna, Rich - they all kind of adopted the boy after a scandalous school production that ultimately resulted in the head of the drama department being fired. Micah and Chris had skipped the play altogether, much rather have spent the night replaying crappy LEGO video games than watching popular people flounce around on stage. Besides, Chris had actually auditioned for that show - for the lead. The role was instead given to Chloe, and Chris had her sneaking suspicions on why she didn’t get cast. Her theories on her body type, race, and general demeanor were too strong to allow her to have any connection with the drama department after that.

“They’re just not my kind of people, you know? Sometimes they just care about things that are too petty for me to really focus on.” Jeremy took a sip of his soda, trying not to visibly recoil at the feeling of so much sugar on his tongue. “I mean, yeah, sure, they help me get through the year as one of ‘those people’ or whatever, but I don't really _want_ to be one of those people.” He glanced around the room, his eyes bouncing from groups of teenagers giggling over a bucket of nachos to a pair of girls with their arms linked through each others. “Half of them wouldn’t be caught dead in a place like this,” he muttered, almost wistfully. “So I really appreciate you guys chilling with me here.”   
“No problem,” Michael said, trying to imagine what it must be like to have friends for the superficial parts of school. “I actually have one question, though.” 

“Shoot.”

“What did you mean when you said that you didn’t expect me to be a wingman?” 

“Psh,” Jeremy reacted, regretting letting himself talk without his words being picked out by his friends. “That note, you know? That we were passing? It kind of made it seem like you wanted to talk about, well, you?” Jeremy bit his lip, remembering something Jenna had told him a few days before during her daily gossip spill. Even then, when he had pretended to be browsing Instagram and only partially listening, the fact had caused color to rush up to the tips of his ears.  “I...I heard that you were into, uh, guys? So I thought that you wanted to talk about that for some reason, and I know that’s your personal business and I shouldn't be bringing it up or anything and - it’s random? Totally not important or anything, cause I totally support you, even though I just met you,” Jeremy chuckled, reaching up with one hand to nervously scratch at the nape of his neck. “Sorry, I’m rambling?” 

Michael felt his face cloud over as he twiddled with the cap of his soda. It  _ was  _ random. For the most part, he hadn’t needed to have this conversation with anyone. He knew that he wasn’t embarrassed by his sexual orientation or anything, but it shocked and almost  _ hurt _ him to learn that other people knew it too. Of course, he was going to come out to everyone one day, or at least he told himself that, but not now. “Who, uh, who told you that?” He heard his own voice crack a bit and had a moment of internal cringe. On his fingers, he counted the number of people he had come out to so far. The list didn’t make it past one hand. His Ma and his Mum, Grammie, and Chris.  

Jeremy had to physically bite his tongue hard enough to draw the coppery taste of blood to avoid  _ snitching. _ He barely knew Jenna, to tell the truth, but she was one of the group. With her twisted web of connections across the school, she could ruin someone’s life in a matter of minutes. She already managed to start that damage with Michael, and he felt as though he was pushing the dagger in deeper with this conversation. This boy, though - Jeremy didn’t know him, either, but it was his personal business. Without taking a second thought, he blurted, “Just someone I know. I’m not sure how they found out, but they did, so.” It was true, for the most part. No one knew anything about how Jenna’s connections worked, but Jeremy himself had a few things he’d rather not have blasted on Instagram or in a forty-part Snapchat story update. There are rumors, even, of a school gossip blog that changes it’s username every few days. 

“Just gossip from one of your little birdies, huh?” Michael scoffed, knitting his eyebrows together defensively.  _ He has no right, _ he thought to himself, suddenly seething,  _ none of them have ANY right. Not this… this faker. He doesn’t belong here, or with those assholes.  _ “Have to give it to the popular jerks. The only time you people get your hands dirty is when you have to go digging through  _ dirt!” _ He swallowed hard, turning on his heel to face the exit of the shop. Turning back over his shoulder, he shook his head. 

“Michael! Wait, man, I didn’t mean anything like that, I swear! I, I  want to get to know you better, okay? I just wanted to talk and-”

“You want to get to know me better? Man, get one of your little spies to do it for you. I’m sure they’ll find something. Maybe they’ll let me figure it out for myself next time before shouting it into the winds.” He grabbed his friend by her arm by the typical machine, where her mouth was hanging open with concentration.

“Mikey! Hey! What’s wrong?” she asked, tearing her eyes away before turning towards the door with him. Pulling against his grip, the pair skidded to a stop a few feet from the exit. 

“I’m sorry, Chrissy, I gotta go, okay?” He choked back a sob that was climbing up in his throat. “You can take the car when you leave, dude, I gotta run.” With that, Michael ran out, the feeling of his sneakers slapping concrete beneath his feet sending vibrations up his spine. He pressed one of his red sleeves to his eyes, desperately trying to stop the steady trickle that had formed there. In the back of his mind, however, lingered his best friend, the jerk she was stuck with, and his not-so-secret secret that had to be circulating by now.

 

“What did you do?” Chris asked, marching towards the other boy, who stood flabbergasted in his wake. “If you hurt him, I swear to God, I’ll beat you up,” she insisted, clenching her fists at her sides. Flustered, the boy continued to gape.

“I mean, I didn’t try to? We were talking, and I mentioned how someone told me that he was gay, and he went ballistic.” 

“Of course he did!” she exclaimed, channeling the benefits of her private acting lessons in her voice. “That’s totally private, dude.” Jeremy sighed.

“He might have mentioned that, actually,” he exhaled sharply. “I’m sorry I ruined your wingman plan, Christine. I didn't know you were who the note was referring to.” He pinched his face up, in a clear expression of  _ I know I messed up, but apologies are hard. _

“Huh,” Chris mumbled back, “I’d rather not go out with some jerk with no sense or privacy, but that’s just a personal preference.” She slung her purse over her shoulder, turning to leave and find Mike. 

“Can ask you something first? I know I don’t have any right to ask for anything, but a quick question?” Christine, with her usual ‘benefit of the doubt’ tendencies, gestured for him to go on. “I thought the note was that he wanted to talk to me. And when he did, gosh, I was over the freaking moon,” he started, pushing the usual commanding thoughts of what his friends would say if they were there from his head. “I didn’t want to mention what I heard about him, but I thought that he wanted to talk to me about that. I thought he finally saw that I was...like him? Again, I totally get that I have no excuse for what I said, but I wanted Michael to see that part of me. For  _ anyone  _ to see that.” Christine felt her hands go limp, her firm grip dropping as she fell under his vocal spell. “None of my friends would even bother trying to pretend to like me if I came out to them. I just need to shout it from the rooftops, you know? A big ‘Hey everyone! I’m bi!’ but that’ll never happen. So, when Mike came up to me, I thought I could finally say something. I guess... I guess not.”

“What’s your question, again?” She murmured, trying to keep her attention steady long enough to hear him out. 

“How can I get a second chance with him? I dunno, ask him to get some coffee?”

Chris gasped, barely containing her excitement behind a small squeak. Excitement, that is, mixed with a bit of regret. Enough to make her feel like she would be a bad friend for not being happy for Mike, and enough to make her heart begin to ache for more reasons than one. “Well, knowing Mike, you'll need a few things,” she said, ticking off things with her fingers. “For starters, you’ll need to get on the good side of his best friend. You got a full dramatic monologue with redeeming qualities and a character arc, so I think you’re okay in that department. Next, be honest with him, okay? If I know anything about him, it’s that he knows how to rat out lies.” She grinned at him, realizing that the wingman plan was still in place, but with reversed roles. 

“Yeah,” Jeremy beamed, nodding. “Yeah, Christine, you’re right. Thank you!” he hollered over his shoulder, racing out the doors.  Her smile turned melancholy, watching as he slipped out of her fingers towards the arms of her best friend. If he let him in, that is, which she knew would prove to be more of a challenge than she had let on.

  
  


Jeremy panted, the soles of his Chucks slapping the pavement in time with his breathing. He zig-zagged along the sidewalks, earning strange and half-hearted glances from tourists and locals respectively. He tried to pass his frantic searching off as window shopping, nodding to displays of mannequins as he sprinted past their glass enclosures. He ruled out stores as he ran, trying to find somewhere that seemed likely to have any connection with Michael. Jeremy was about to move on from an intersection filled with only coffee shops and hipster-esque places when he noticed a corner store a few feet away. It’s exposed brick made it easy enough to blend in, but the bright sign hanging above the door set off some sort of bell in his head. It was neon blue and blinking slowly, the lights flashing out a message in a few different fonts. ELECTRIC RECORDS, it read, and the boy made his way towards the entrance. He made his way into the shop but wasn’t more than three steps in before a snapping voice came from the front end of the room.   
“What do you want, hotshot?” It said, coming from a young man about his age behind the checkout desk. He slammed his tan hands down on the counter, seething. Something about his thick Jersey accent and his backwards baseball cap seemed familiar to Jeremy, probably from a distant school memory.

“I’m sorry?” Jeremy hesitated.

“I asked you what you wanted, jackass,” the boy said again, his face flushing. The name tag on pinned to his blue flannel shirt read DUSTIN! But he didn’t quite seem like an exclamation point type of guy. “Now you don't remember me, huh?”

“Listen, man, I don’t know what I did-”

“That’s not my name, jerk. You know, the kid your jock buddy would shove out of the way every day. Or the kid your other short dude would make fun of?” Jeremy gaped, not recalling any of this. He didn’t know Rich or Jake too well before the school play, but of course he could be seen around them. And of course they would roughhouse a few guys, just to keep morale up. He knew full well that he hadn’t done anything like that. He didn’t say anything to protest otherwise, but he scrolled past Jenna’s videos of their casual bullying instead of liking them. That counted for something in his book.

“My friends have changed, dude. Dustin. I never did any of that stuff, I swear.”

“Then why does my cousin tell me that you’re still hanging out with them?” He gestured to a back room with his thumb, which could be seen overflowing with records and a couple of gaming chairs. 

“Your cousin?” Jeremy scoffed, starting to get a sense of disdain mixed with dread. More than anything, he wanted to leave.

“What are you talking about me for, Dust?” someone asked from the storage room. He pulled his headphones down around his neck, barely looking up from his phone until he was standing next to his supposed cousin. “Who are you pissed at today?” he grumbled tiredly. He flicked his eyes upward and noticed the boy in front of him, his happy expression quickly turning green.

“Oh, I see!” Dustin exclaimed, squeezing the edge of the wooden desk until his knuckles turned visibly white. “You should have told me this asshole was your  _ friend _ . I would have been a lot more inviting,” he said sarcastically. Jeremy took a step back, although he couldn’t tell if it was a reflex or a precaution. 

“What are you doing here?” Michael finally burst after a moment of tense silence, Dustin about ready to pounce. “Aren’t you supposed to be going on a date with Christine right about now? Or at least trying to talk to her?” he sighed, running his fingers through his thick black hair. “I only went through this crap for her, you know.”

“I get that, man, I really do. It’s just…” he looked at Dustin for a moment before setting his focus back on Michael. “A conversation alone, maybe?” Dustin seemed like those old cartoons (even though he couldn’t be older than Jeremy) with steam almost pouring out of his ears. 

“Whatever you gotta say to my bro you can say right here, hotshot,” he said, gesturing to the empty store that stood around them. The shelves stacked with vinyls and CDs seemed to grow and Jeremy, towering and trapping him with Dustin and the boy he actually came to talk to. 

“Right, yeah,” he started, feeling his throat start to close up as it did during class presentations and heated conversations between his friends.  _ Breathe,  _ he reminded himself, tapping his finger on the leg of his jeans.    
  


Michael couldn’t stand still long enough for this boy to start talking. He ran from across town, or wherever he was, only to stand in his cousin's shop and do nothing? He watched as Jeremy’s hands seemed to fly from one place to fidget to another, from picking at a loose thread on his clothes to running his fingers through his hair.  Michael was itching to just kick the boy out if only to see his expression once thrust on the sidewalk. He was about to gesture to the door with a newfound ounce of spite when his phone buzzed out the tune of  _ Guns and Ships _ in his pocket. Chris’s personal ringtone, set when she managed to unlock his phone when he fell asleep during a typical movie-binging session. He pulled it out and tapped the screen, maneuvering the buttons until his messages came up. A short message from his friend was front and center, short yet dramatic in her usual style. 

_ If someone comes to visit you today, hear them out. Who knows what’ll happen?? ;) _

Michael was almost certain that his friend had finally gone insane. His fingers were hovering over the keypad to say so when another message popped up. 

_ In case you didn’t get that, I mean Jeremy. Trust me!! _

If anything had been proved over the years with Chris, it's that when she’s certain about something, it’s imperative to listen. She was the one to first introduce him to putting potato chips on sandwiches and the first one to point out that boys always seemed hotter with messy hair. No matter what subject. If Canigula declared that rocket science wouldn’t be needed in the future, the world needed to take note. It seemed, at the moment, that Michael was her world and her main dispensary of wisdom. “What’s up, Jeremy? Need a record? Cause I can hook you up there,” he said, smoothing his voice out as they did in cheesy romance movies. Not that this would turn into one of those, because his faith in Chris’ matchmaking ability only went so far. The discomfort on Jeremy’s face became more noticeable the longer Dustin stared him down, so Michael nudged his cousin a bit harder than he should have and gesture to the back room. 

“Jesus, fine. Sorry for trying to keep an asshole out of your pants,” he muttered, slouching into the back room. Dustin had owned this place since the old owner had died, the summer after his senior year of college. The old dude had given him part-time jobs since middle school, so Dustin knew the building inside and out. His parents weren’t cool with him skipping college, and Dustin moved all his junk from his parents’ apartment to the back room. He let Michael stop by whenever he wanted to, whether it be from trying out his Orbit Turntable to grabbing a pop and ramming Mario Karts into one another. 

“So,” Jeremy started, flipping through a stack of Frank Sinatra records, “What I heard about you...It’s B.S. that gossip like that is even going around? I know it’s more than just gossip, of course, cause it’s your life and who you love and I shouldn’t know anything about that?” Jeremy steeled himself with a quick breath. “It’s my friends.” Another breath. “Those assholes I hang out with. I don't even think they’re really my friends, you know? Friends are supposed to be there for each other, but they’re out here spreading crap about the only cute boy at school. God, if they knew about me...I’d be bullied harder than a superhero in his backstory flashback!” he chuckled, only now looking up at Michael. 

“Was that a redemption monologue?” he asked, considering. “I mean, I’m both flattered and confused. Maybe a bit more flattered, though,” he allowed himself to grin for a moment. 

“Holy mother of- I didn’t mean to make that sound so fake. I’m just kind of spilling my guts here because lord knows I couldn’t do that with the other people at school, but you just seem so easy to tal-”

“It was a bit ‘anime villain redemption arc’, but not in a bad way. It’s just the type of thing to get Chris so excited about you. She digs honesty like that, dude.” he nodded in a dad-like approval. “If you didn’t spill tea about her or blast ancient family secrets about her ancestors, you might be an okay guy. In terms of guys I would have to third wheel for on movie nights, anyway,” he wiped a fleck of dust off of the screen of the cash register. 

“Aw, I got compared to Zuko while venting. How sweet,” Michael actually laughed at that, and Jeremy felt slightly less loser-like for finding a good place to implement cartoon jokes. He leaned forward on the counter, his elbows resting on a single piece of plexiglass that kept him from falling into a display of Beatles memorabilia. “But I wasn’t really trying to get on your good side only for Chris. I’m definitely trying to get on your good side, cause I’m not some spying and tea spilling jerk, but more for you, man.” Jeremy once read in a Buzzfeed article that being subtle was all that you needed to ask someone out -- body language, conversations, a pick-up line, and bam! Done deal. He was starting to understand why Buzzfeed articles had such a bad reputation, especially with such captivating titles like “Chose Your Favorite Fruits From Whole Foods Market And We’ll Tell You How To Get A Significant Other In Three Easy Steps.” Jeremy was starting to feel like that was a wasted few clicks because the boy in front of him stared up blankly. He cleared his throat. “You know, what I’m trying to say is tha-”

“I get what you’re trying to say, dumbass,” Michael responded, grabbing a capless pen from a mug on the counter and a receipt that a customer left behind after their purchase. Michael scrawled down his number in his typical mess of handwriting, which he blamed on the penmanship test he failed in second grade, and handed the slip to Jeremy. “I’m handing this over on your word that you won’t spread shit about me, okay? Cause I swear, if my name even shows up on Instagram, I will hack the whole app and turn it into MySpace: 2019 edition.” Smirking, Mike balanced his elbow on the countertop while holding up his closed fist, his pinky out. When Jeremy didn’t move, Michael spoke again. “Hey, a pinky promise is not a request. That stuff is a requirement. The signing of the metaphorical contract that I would have written out if I had a lawyer.” With a simper, Jeremy grabbed his pinky.

 

With her head sticking out between a row of David Bowie albums and her phone held precariously by her face, the girl clicked on the red ‘Record’ button and took a short clip. Nothing more than a few seconds and with barely any comprehendible audio, but it was enough to see Jeremy’s lingering squeeze on the other boy's hand and the blush that had reddened the tip of his ears. The way he laughed at one of Michael’s inaudible jokes and his nervous finger-tapping on the leg of his jeans. She wrapped up the video and pulled up her messaging app, opening her contact for her friend Jenna. She attached the video with a simple two emoji caption: a pixelated pride flag and a pair of suspicious eyes. Another click, taking less than a second to perform, and the message was off. Nothing more than data traveling from one phone to another, numbers that could be reassembled and broken apart with ease until another girl, halfway across town, got the message. Jenna wasn’t surprised to receive another message from the girl, as she had had a weekly average of thirty-five such reports from her alone. The subject of the video brought something closer to an actual laugh to her face than a huff of air that passed for a “LOL”  nowadays. It wasn’t unexpected to see the runt of the popular litter dabbling in that crap, but no less than a month ago, she had brought the topic up. “Jeremy,” Jenna had said, pulling him to the far end of the lunch table, “If you don’t stop looking at that loser kid in science, things will seem messy. People always get the wrong idea, you know? But seriously, it’s hard to not notice. So keep it in your pants, okay?”

“W- The hell, Jenna? You’re not even in that class?” he had said, his voice more of a question. At the time, she couldn’t fathom how someone could be that thick-skulled. 

“Well, duh, Heere, but other people are. And everything you do, now that you sit  _ here,”  _ she gestured to the table that was filled with beaming, obnoxiously popular people, “reflects back on them. So think, Jeremy! Ta-ta!” She had given him fair warning. That’s was she repeated to herself for the next half hour as she blasted the video on her personal Instagram, the school tea blog that she claimed to have no affiliation with, a few group chats, and her Facebook page (for any of her older followers, or relatives who happen to follow gossip.) Standard procedure, more or less. By her calculations, this post, with the proper captions, like an “OMG WHO TAPED THIS” and a “WOAH EVERYONE YOU NEED TO SEE THIS OR YOU’LL TOTALLY REGRET IT”, could reach most of the school in six hours, give or take. 

 

Turns out, Jeremy could forget a whole lot of stuff when he had Michael Mell’s phone number burning a hole in his pocket. He wasn’t even sure how he made it home without forgetting how to drive or even his own house number. Suddenly, a single piece of paper managed to control half of his brain with the other half probably in charge of breathing and circulation and all the other stuff. It took him a record amount of time to park his car, leap out, brush past his dad and finally make it upstairs before crashing down on his bed. When thought about in dramatic verbs, it really sounds like a complicated gymnastics routine rather than Jeremy clumsily making his way to his room on autopilot. He slipped his phone out of his pocket, almost dropping it once or twice, and punched in the number that popped out on the receipt for two Rolling Stones, a Frank Sinatra and the original cast recording of Hamilton. After what seemed like an hour debating whether to call or text (text, of course), and another possible-hour trying to decide how to start the conversation, he opted for the bare minimum. 

_ Hey. It’s Jeremy, _ he sent before he could take any time to fret over punctuation.

It didn’t take long to get a reply, but long enough for Jeremy to regret sending it at all. He generally despised texting and calling alike and found that any length between responses is too long. He would probably be too afraid to call 9-1-1 out of fear that they wouldn’t pick up the phone. 

_ My moms are trying to cut out any possible “stranger danger” shit, so beware of my power to block and report you.  _

No matter how menacing that sounded, Jer chuckled.

JEREMY:  _ I’ll be sure to keep that in mind. This is Michael, right? _

MICHAEL:  _ It’s actually pronounced ‘The Man Of Everyone’s Dreams’ but Michael works too I guess _

Oh lord and Torah. Is that a joke? It was too straightforward to be a joke. Well, not straight, but…whatever. Should he say something back? Normally, if someone in his friend group needed help flirting, they had enough experts around the table to draft, write, edit and produce a romantic masterpiece. Once, Jake had liked a girl so much that he whipped up a full sonnet rivaled only by an English teacher in a single go at the lunch table. They saw flirting as an art, and Jeremy didn’t have a creative bone in his body.

JEREMY:  _ Haha, you’re right. _

MICHAEL:  _ I would think that was smooth if I didn’t see the ellipses popping up and disappearing by your name every few seconds _

JEREMY:  _ Shoot. I forgot that was a thing you could see _

MICHAEL:  _ I’m gonna pretend like that doesn’t make you sound super lonely, for your sake and mine. How’s it hanging? _

JEREMY:  _ I’m just reminding myself how bad I am at texting _

MICHAEL:  _ F’real. You TOTALLY suck. Do you want to stop texting, then? Maybe meet up somewhere? _

Jeremy was deciding that he didn’t have the time or brain capacity to unpack all of that when another message took up the top half of his screen. A new ringtone filled his room, advertising a group chat alert. He only belonged to one, so it wasn’t hard to figure out who was addressing him, but he was still startled to actually see his name show up in a message from the SQUIP SQUAD chat. In fact, he was surprised he hadn’t been kicked out of it yet. He didn’t know what the name of the chat meant, but Rich had made it that after the school play and no one had bothered to change it back. He opened the chat to see a video of himself. It was in profile, but he could make out his hair, the curve of his jaw, and the familiar school colors of his varsity jacket. The lighting was awful and made his auburn hair appear a distasteful mud brown. The person across from him was barely recognizable as well, but it seemed at least one other person in the chat knew who it was. The caption as simple:  _  A LITTLE BIRDIE CAUGHT THIS ON TAPE!  _ Before he knew it, the messages started pouring in. One after the other, each either containing his name or his first initial. They crashed into one another like a wave ramming into rocks, each message more abrupt and obscure than the last. The usernames blended together with the mixtures of emojis and flabbergasted words. 

_ Woah there Jeremy is that a pinky promise or a promise ring lmao _

_ Get a room and just suck it already _

_ You’re blushing so hard Jeremy calm your tits _

_ I told you to get laid but not like this ew _

_ OMG this is totally going on my Instagram who wants to be tagged _

_ You better be glad we found this instead of someone else. Can you imagine if the football team saw this?  _

_ Brooke, tag the football team in this! _

_ Best Idea I’ve heard alllllll gay. I mean DAY haha _

_ SO gay _

It’s incredible how quickly this generation can type. Jeremy was too stiff to even bend his fingers or look anywhere but the glowing screen but they wrote a brief novel. His brain was a million miles away as he tapped out a response.

_ Guys shut up _ he wrote,  _ it was nothing. _

_ And the man of the hour actually speaks!  _ Responded another number.

_ Oh, Jeremy! Who tf is this kid? He looks trashy _

_ WAIT! I think his dad mowed our lawn on the weekends or something… _

_ Jake, that’s so racist. Besides, he’s in my European Lit. Kid doesn’t even  have a dad _

_ Oh yeah, his moms are gay afff. Chromosomes really DO carry like that huh? _

Jeremy felt his breath catch in his throat, not wanting to wait around as they tried to put more pieces together. He didn’t even know the kid that well, aside from the moment in the record store and the arcade, with a few stolen glances in science class, but it still felt weird to throw him under the bus by just talking to him. And maybe crushing on him, but whatever. 

_ Matthew, I think? Michael? _

Who even recorded them? Is this the frigging Truman Show? Could you call the cops on this? It’s probably illegal somewhere. Violation of privacy or unapproved filming or something. Then again, everything is legal in New Jersey. 

_ Michael sounds right! Heard he got detention for sneaking out of class to go to a snack mart at one of those gas stations lmao _

Michael doesn’t deserve this crap. No one does, right? But Jeremy had promised and broken that within seconds. Unknowingly, still, but he could lose a friend he barely had time to make. He could become an outsider in the only group he was ever a part of and with the only person who actually made him feel good, even if he didn’t have the opportunity to return the favor. In the midst of the message whirlwind, Michael’s number popped back up in their private message.

MICHAEL:  _ Texting is fine too, slowpoke. Practice makes perfect or whatever they say on those inspirational posters  _

MICHAEL:  _ Is everything okay? I can head out for a bit if you need that _

He doesn’t deserve this, Jeremy decided, or re-decided. It’s the best thing this school could have done for him to keep him out of all the messy crap.  

JEREMY:  _ Sorry bout that. Just drama with the popular gang. It’s a mess.  _

MICHAEL:  _ Isn’t ALL of that a mess? _

He shouldn't have to experience that firsthand. Jeremy was starting to think that he never actually wanted to be rescued by them, even. It was more of an unrequested adoption, one that metaphorical him would try to break out of when he found solid ground to stand on. For now, he had misery on one side and Michael on the other.  

 

“Chris,” Michael said, fiddling with his phone as he waited for a reply, “How come you never told me that he was cute?” He meant for the sarcasm to be more evident in his voice, but it the other boy’s appeal was starting to seem more fact than dramatization. 

“I’m glad you like him so much, Micha,” Chris said back, scrolling through Twitter halfheartedly while spinning on the desk chair that her friend had placed in the corner of his room. Michael was sprawled out on his bed, his arms spread out, and he was almost able to graze the opposite walls of his room with his fingertips.

“But?” Michael asked.

“Butt what?”

“You sounded like you were going to say something else. Something that would change the course of the plot of this whole ordeal even though it seems so close to being tied up in a little bow.”

“It’s just,” Chris sighed, “It’s just crazy how quickly the tables have turned. But I’m happy for you, man, and I really mean that. This totally isn’t the direction I thought this whole thing would go in.” 

“Yeah. I get that. I mean, I have to deal with that crap all the time, you know? Like how in freshman year when you started going out with Rufus Emeterio and I couldn’t say how much I liked him ‘cause I was three miles deep in the closet,” he said, turning the ringer all the way up on his phone. 

“That’s different, Michael, and you know it. I didn’t know you were gay.”

“Is it, Chris?” 

“I said I was happy for you, dude,” she said, skidding to a stop as she dug her heels into the carpet to slow down her spin. She wasn’t sure how overjoyed she was that her best friend ignored his sworn wingman duties, but she would always support him. No matter what, they always told each other. That was just how their relationship went.  

“I really don’t think you ar-”

“Well, I’m sorry if it’s hard for me to jump up and throw a party, Mikey, cause this wasn’t  _ about you.  _ You said you would be my wingman, remember? You were gonna help me, right? Or did you forget that too?”

“I...I didn’t forget that, dude, but other things came up,” he said, squeezing his phone so hard he thought it might break. He never fought with her, unless it was over some petty pop culture crap, ao this was more than a little strange. And more than a little unwelcome. 

“Like your knob?”

“Excuse me?” he sighed, taking off his glasses and rubbing his eyes in exasperation. “I’m sorry, and I’ll say that as many times as you need me to. He was being a jerk but you told me to be nice to him, so I listened. I get that you regret that now, but I need you to support me. I would do the same for you in an instant,” he decided, knowing full well none of this could’ve happened without her. 

“I  _ do _ regret giving him up, I think,” she admitted, slowly shaking her head, “but I’d regret leaving you to make a fool of yourself a whole lot more,” her shoulders sagged a bit, but she would never go back on her best friend. Besides, if they got together, she could make fun of him 24/7. It would turn into a great wedding speech if best comes to best for him. Worst to worst for her. 

 

JEREMY:  _ Would you mind if I came over for a bit? I wanted to talk w/ you. _

He knew how straightforward it was, but he needed to say what was on his mind as well as what was on his phone screen. He hadn’t brought himself to check Instagram in a matter of hours, which was a habit drilled into him but Chloe and Brooke alike. The had motto they liked to remind him of: You’ll never hear one of us repeating gossip, so you better be sure to listen closely while we’re posting it. They said that Instagram was the make-or-break, as in the place to pity post about breakups or find the best makeup tutorial in the same sitting. 

MICHEAL:  _ Yeah, sure. Send your address. Also, I’m bringing Chris for parental supervision. Her call, not mine. _

It’s just like Dustin all over again. A nicer, crushing-on-Jeremy Dustin, but defensive nonetheless. Judgment day: Part two. 

JEREMY:   _ Tell her that it’s all cool. Wait. All cool as long as she brings snacks. I’m the third house down Sherman. _

MICHAEL:  _ Deal. We’ll be there right after a 711 run. _

 

Michael’s ability to find the most food for the least amount of money was another talent Jeremy didn’t know enough about. “Hey,” he said, sidestepping around Jeremy at the door of his home to dump his load of food on the kitchen table. “I didn’t know what flavor you liked, so I just got a basic blue,” he held up a sticky plastic cup filled to the brim with slush and handed it to the boy. Chris slurped on her frozen Coca-Cola as Jeremy looked down into his own.

“Thanks,” he grinned, “This is perfect.” Chris nodded, but he couldn’t tell if it was out of agreement or her trying to avoid a brain freeze. 

“My idea, no matter what Micha says,” she glanced her friend, who flicked his hand towards the door subtly enough that Jeremy thought he just had a hand cramp. He used to get those when Brooke taught him how to type on a mobile phone. She taught him to use as many acronyms as possible, but it still took a toll on his metacarpal. “Hey, Jer, do you need me to go for this chat thing? Michael is shooing me out like I’m his moms on the first day of school.”

“Nah, Chris, chill out. Make yourself comfortable. If this goes as I hope it will, we’ll be hanging out a lot more.” Michael blanched as Christine giggled, bouncing her straw of the inside of her slushy lid to make a tiny drum set.  _ Smooth,  _ she mouthed to her friend. “What I really wanted to say to you guys is that I’m  _ really _ not like them. They, the popular gang, scooped me up after the school play and never really let me go,” he looked down at his socks, a pair of Vineyard Vines that Jake had bought him for his birthday. At the moment, he wanted nothing more than to burn them and swap them out for the limited edition pair that came in a Cheerios box during a Pac-Man promotion. “But there’s something different about you, Mike, and I would forget them all in a heartbeat if I could spend more time with you. Be who I am around you.” The last bit of color drained from Michael’s face. “And I know you’d probably get some crap from the others about me, and I wanted to see if you were okay with that. I mean, we’re already on Instagram for being within ten feet of each other, and that sucks, but I wanted to let you know that it will always be a risk.” 

The other boy looked around cluelessly. From the ceiling to the floor, to Jeremy’s face, which was suddenly bewitching, and back again. 

“Oh my  _ god _ ,” Chris said, exhaling so hard she looked like she might burst. “He just kinda-sorta asked you to be BF’s and you’re just going to stand there? Micheal Ernesto Crisanto Libelato Mell, when your mothers hear about this…”

“Wait, you have three middle names?” Jeremy asked.

“Not important, but there’s a long and complicated backstory for each one,” Chris responded. “Okay, maybe that’s kind of important.”

“Wait, Chris, you’d be okay with me going out with him?” Michael peeped his first words in what seemed to be hours.

“Yeah, dingus. If you’re happy I’m happy and all that jazz.” Jeremy didn’t know too much about their relationship, but they seemed like siblings on a really diverse sitcom. Maybe it would be nominated for best cast or something. He grinned at them both.

“Screw it, Jeremy, there’s always going to be a risk. Let’s do it. Make us a trending ship on Instagram if it comes to that.” Jeremy released a breath he didn’t know he had been holding. Potential, freedom, and a future taking the place of a past in one gust of wind. For one of the millions of times in his life, Jeremy Heere had no words. 

“Guys, holy crap,” Chris muttered, snapping him out of his trance. “Get over here.” She grabbed her phone and pulled the two boys in close, a solid mom-style selfie. It was a crappy photo, really, no filters no matter how much the three of them needed it. It was innocent, filled with potential and a look in Christine’s eyes that was absolute certainty. It was the kind of picture to send to the only group chat you belonged in, the picture to make the pinned post on all social media sites, and maybe even the one to haphazardly glue in a photo album one day. Who knew?  

The little birdie sure didn’t.   


End file.
